Podbit · The Shawn Ryan Show
Children in foster care are twice as likely to suffer from PTSD as combat veterans. They never signed up for a war, never had a choice about being on the front lines — and yet they carry more trauma than most soldiers ever will.
Where this was said
At 26:58 · chapter starts 25:00
Jen Lilley traces the roots of her advocacy to her childhood: her father was a judge and her mother worked at a crisis pregnancy center, and their home regularly housed people in transition — though never as licensed foster parents, to avoid the appearance of judicial bias. That exposure planted seeds of empathy that would eventually blossom into a full-fledged foster and adoption journey. She then lands one of the episode's most startling statistics: children in foster care are twice as likely to suffer PTSD as combat veterans. And she takes direct aim at the most common reason people give for not fostering — 'I'd get too attached.' Lilley calls this statement the most maddening thing she hears as an advocate, arguing that emotional attachment is precisely what traumatized children need from caregivers.
Research shows children in foster care are twice as likely to suffer from PTSD as combat veterans, reflecting the severity of trauma they endure.
AI nailed Andrew Huberman's vertigo-vs-low-blood-pressure diagnosis because that pattern has been reported millions of times. But every patient's liver is different and data on liver surgeries is scarce worldwide — making solo robot surgery dangerous. The rule is simple: data abundance means AI can help; data scarcity means keep the human in the loop.
Fei-Fei Li's father had liver surgery performed by a da Vinci robot guided by a surgeon. The result: 10 times less blood loss than a typical procedure. This isn't replacement — it's the gold standard of human-machine collaboration, where the human's judgment and the robot's precision combine.
US drug overdose deaths fell from 110,000 to roughly 70,000 — the biggest CDC-recorded single-year drop ever. Men's rates fell 27% in one year, and the steepest decline of all was among 15–24-year-olds, down 37%. The crisis narrative around young men needs to make room for signs of genuine progress.
Kessler thought his grief expertise would protect him. It didn't. When his son David died unexpectedly, he found himself on the floor — and eventually realized that acceptance alone wasn't enough. That unmet need became the sixth stage: finding meaning.
Grief isn't just death — it's any unwanted change. Kessler lectured at Coca-Cola and General Mills not because they had lots of funerals, but because change management is grief management. People who grieve well live well.
Witnessing someone's grief isn't just emotional support — it's an essential act of healing. Kessler argues grief is a severance and connection heals it. But real witnessing has two steps: seeing the pain AND affirming the person's capacity to recover.
Avoiding grief isn't free — it's exhausting. Kessler's beach ball metaphor nails it: pushing a small balloon down is easy, but holding a massive beach ball underwater takes constant, draining energy. Unattended feelings don't disappear; they just consume you.
Most people try to control their environment to avoid triggers. Kessler flips this entirely: triggers aren't problems to manage around — they're a detailed map to your pain and your healing. Every trigger points directly to what needs attention.
Running from pain doesn't leave it behind — it accelerates the chase. Whatever we run from pursues us, and whatever we face transforms us. Both Kessler and Lewis Howes testify to knowing both roads firsthand.
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